get more FROM YOUR food

How you pre­pare and cook your food can make all the dif­fer­ence. This is how to get the most from your in­gre­di­ents …

Some veg­eta­bles are more ben­e­fi­cial eaten raw, in­clud­ing broc­coli and wa­ter­cress, as heat re­duces the po­tency of help­ful nat­u­ral com­pounds.

To peel or not to peel?

Don’t au­to­mat­i­cally reach for the peeler. Eg­g­plant skin is rich in pro­tec­tive an­tho­cyanins – the same ben­e­fi­cial com­pounds found in blue­ber­ries – while cu­cum­ber skin is packed with sil­ica, es­sen­tial for healthy hair and nails. Sim­i­larly, the skins of zuc­chi­nis are a use­ful source of lutein and zeax­an­thin, which pro­mote healthy eyes. If you plan to eat un­peeled veg, al­ways wash them well be­fore­hand.

Choose frozen

At cer­tain times of the year, frozen fruit and veg – which are frozen as soon as they are picked – will con­tain more ben­e­fi­cial nu­tri­ents than fresh pro­duce, which has been trans­ported and stored, caus­ing it to lose valu­able nu­tri­ents.

Don’t be afraid of fat

Fat can help us ab­sorb cer­tain nu­tri­ents. For ex­am­ple, by adding oil to veg­eta­bles you’ll in­crease your ab­sorp­tion of be­tac­arotene, which is con­verted into vi­ta­min A – good for healthy skin. En­joy a spinach salad with vinai­grette dress­ing, and vine toma­toes driz­zled with olive oil.

Get more from gar­lic

To get the most from the healthy com­pound al­licin, chop or slice gar­lic 10 min­utes be­fore you need it, and add to the dish shortly be­fore the end of cook­ing. If heated for too long, the health ben­e­fits are re­duced.